1. Field
The present invention relates generally to magnetic read and/or write heads and methods of manufacture, and more particularly to magnetoresistive sensors or devices having bearing surface protections and methods of lapping the devices using a reference and monitoring device, and methods of producing high precision stripe height and improved thickness control of the second read gap in magnetoresistive devices.
2. Description of Related Art
Magnetic storage tape continues to be an efficient and effective medium for data storage in computer systems. Increased data storage capacity and retrieval performance is desired of all commercially viable mass storage devices and media. In the case of linear tape recording, a popular trend is toward multi-bump, multi-channel fixed head structures with narrowed recording gaps and data track widths so that many linear data tracks may be achieved on a tape medium of a predetermined width, such as one-half inch width tape. To increase the storage density of magnetic tapes and storage systems, data transducer elements, e.g., magnetoresistive (MR) elements or devices, on the head and data tracks on the tape are arranged with greater density.
Magnetic tape heads typically include an active device region including raised strips or ridges, commonly referred to as islands, bumps, or rails, that provide a raised tape support or wear surface across which the magnetic tape advances. One or more of these raised islands includes embedded data transducers. The embedded transducers can be either a recording device for writing information to a magnetic tape or a reproducing device for reading information from a magnetic tape. An embedded recording device produces a magnetic field in the vicinity of a small gap in the core of the device, which causes information to be stored on a magnetic tape as the tape advances across the support surface. In contrast, a reproducing device detects a magnetic field from the surface of a magnetic tape as the tape advances over the support surface. Additionally, raised islands may be included without transducers to help support and guide the magnetic tape over the head, generally referred to as outriggers.
Typically, a plurality of embedded transducers are spaced transversely across a direction of tape transport. The transducers may be sized and disposed along an island for varying storage tape data formats, e.g., different numbers of channels, track widths, and track densities. For example, a four channel head includes four read and four write transducers spaced transversely across a tape path. The width of the read/write transducers and the distance between adjacent read/write transducers are associated with the density of tracks to be written to and read from the storage tape. Storage capacity of magnetic tapes is generally increased with the use of smaller more closely positioned read/write transducers in the tape head.
As the storage tape and tape drive industry evolves and achieves increases in storage capacity, the tape head and media designs continue to make changes from one generation to the next. For instance, new data formats with more densely positioned read/write transducer elements on tape heads, more densely positioned tracks on the storage tape, and thinner storage tape increases the storage capacity of storage tape devices. For example, to increase storage capacity of storage tape, the storage tape may be thinned, e.g., lower magnetization thickness (Mrt), while narrowing and thinning the MR sensors in the head.
Typical MR sensors for use with magnetic recording heads are manufactured using standard semiconductor type processing methods. For example, multiple rows of magnetic recording transducers are deposited simultaneously on wafer substrates and cut into active device regions for incorporation into a magnetic recording head. After a section of magnetic recording transducers are cut from the wafer, they are subject to a lapping process to reduce the stripe heights of the MR -sensors to a desired height and smooth or polish the surface of the structure. Stripe height is one of the key parameters that control the signal output and device behavior of a magnetoresistive recording head. The stripe height generally determines the sensitivity of the magnetoresistive device to a magnetic field, where a reduction in stripe height typically produces a more sensitive magnetoresistive device. As magnetic recording density increases, scaled down MR sensors, e.g., anisotropic magnetoresistive (AMR), giant magnetoresistive (GMR), or tunneling giant magnetoresistive (TGMR) devices, are used to achieve adequate signal output.
The desire for shorter stripe height leads to a desire for tighter control of stripe height during manufacturing, which is generally accomplished by mechanical lapping using one or more Electronic Lapping Guides (ELGs). It is generally unwise to use the actual MR sensors for monitoring stripe height because of the potential for electrostatic discharge during the lapping process, which may damage the device. In the manufacture of typical multi-channel tape heads on a wafer, for example, a pair of ELGs is disposed at each end of a cluster of MR sensors. The ELGs are monitored during manufacturing to determine the stripe height of the active MR sensors of the cluster. For example, the lapping process is controlled to cease when the ELG resistance reaches a calculated value associated with a desired stripe height of the MR sensors. The calculated ELG resistance, however, is subjected to variations in the geometry and material thickness of the ELG devices, which may result in large cluster-to-cluster stripe height variations.
Additionally, certain materials in MR sensors (and in particular, GMR and TGMR sensors) exposed on the head surface (also known as the air bearing surface or “ABS” with respect to disk drive heads, and the tape bearing surface or “TBS” with respect to tape drive heads) may be prone to corrosion, making heads which utilize MR sensors extremely sensitive to corrosion in the environments in which they are expected to operate. Disk drive heads, which operate in an environment sealed at the factory in clean room conditions, are less susceptible to corrosion than tape drive heads, which must operate while exposed to an often quite harsh ambient atmosphere. Also, typically the ABS of the disk drive head is coated with a thin protective film, which is hard and wear resistant on the air bearing surface of a disk drive head. Unfortunately, the nature of tape recording makes conventional protective overcoats a poor solution for tape drive heads because tape recording involves contact between the tape and head, and the surface of the tape is more abrasive than that of a disk. Consequently, a thin protective film generally wears away leading to degradation of the sensor materials and device performance. In the case of TGMR sensors, which typically replace a copper spacer with an ultra-thin insulator spacer (e.g., 7-9 Å), smearing across the insulator spacer during use may destroy the tunneling effect and render the TGMR sensor non-functional.